These days, there are a plethora of craft-brew-heavy destinations around the world for adventurous suds lovers to visit. Our own home state of Colorado boasts over 340 breweries according to a pretty half-assed internet search, translating to something like six breweries for every 100,000 people who live here*. With breweries to visit aplenty (and weed destinations too – look it up), places like CO take on a Wonka-like quality for intrepid imbibers.

We brewed a special small batch collab with our friends at Cigar City Brewing for the 5th annual Collaboration Beer Fest. The fest is a nod to the traditions of innovation and comraderie that have always made the craft beer community the wild, crazy and completely RAD group that it is. Visitors get a chance to try rare tappings created specifically for the festival, like this one:

Sub Straight IPA (Collaboration with Cigar City Brewing), 6.7% ABV: Our main HOBO Tim Matthews and Cigar City’s Brewmaster Wayne Wambles got together for a total nerdfest to create Sub Straight IPA – a complex, floral and citrus-y brew that is total blue-ribbon-at-the-science-fair material. The brewers focused on two biochemical processes that go down when hops are added into a fermentation and split the dry hop into two sessions – one at the tail end of peak fermentation and the other after fermentation. First, they targeted biotransformation by selecting hops high in an essential oil called geraniol, mutating it into citronellol in a floral-to-citrus switcheroo. Then, they doubled down on the nerdery with a second round of dry hops added along with a supplementary enzyme called beta-glucosidase, which boosts citrus flavor and aroma notes by breaking down the bonds between sugars and oils in glycosides. Phew. Don’t worry, there’s not a pop quiz at the end – just another round.

Come find us at the fest March 31 at the Hyatt Regency in Downtown Denver! Lyons Head Brewer Juice Drapeau will be there hanging out and answering questions.

Read more about the Collaboration Beer Fest including ticket information here.

Every first Thursday of the month, we’re unleashing some small batch specialty brews on ya. Stop into one of our taprooms – Boulder, Longmont, or Brevard and try something rare. Sip ’em at the bar, or grab a Crowler to go. This month’s release events are April 5 starting at 4pm. Details on the beers: (more…)

If you’re into big, hoppy, juicy beers, you may be familiar with GUBNA Imperial IPA. GUBNA reinvents itself once a year for a seasonal release, based on an annual hop selection led by our employees. In honor of this year’s release, we’d like to tell you a little bit about this batch of GUBNA; but we’d also like to introduce you to GUBNA THE PERSON – yes, he’s an actual living person. Read on.

This year, GUBNA (the beer) rules from atop a pedestal of spicy, herbal Crystal hops; juicy, fruity Eldorado; and tropical, tangerine-esque Azacca, hand-picked by over 60 of our employees at this year’s hop selection. It’s hopped four times – in the mash addition, wort addition, and twice kettle dry-hopped with an almost obnoxious 6.7% hop load (that means it’s 50% more hoptuous than the most hopmonious previous incarnation of GUBNA). That noble hop lineup is set against a spicy, viscous and downright regal 15% Rye Malt backbone. It’s inexplicably quaffable at 10% ABV.

Clearly, we could talk about GUBNA all day – it’s one of our favorite brews. But don’t take just our word for it; past versions of GUBNA have been reviewed thousands of times by craft beer drinkers on sites like BeerAdvocate and RateBeer. Here are some highlights: